Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
A town of 14,259 in Midlothian, Scotland. Private rents average £1,507 a month.
Police Scotland doesn’t publish street-level crime, so Mayfield has no Safety Grade and, without it, no overall grade. Its other subjects are graded below. Its strongest subject is walkability (A): 27% of commuters walk, cycle or take public transport. Its weakest is health (D): life expectancy 77.5 for men, 81.7 for women. The median home sold for £213,700 in the last three years, 4.2 times what households in the Midlothian council area earn in a year.
The 3 things Mayfield does most differently from other towns.
Each subject compared with the 2,160 UK towns with an overall grade (schools within Scotland), ordered by how far Mayfield is from typical. American towns are graded separately.
Police Scotland doesn’t publish street-level crime, so Mayfield has no Safety Grade and, without it, no overall grade. Its other subjects are graded below.
How TownRatings grades towns →
Historic Environment Scotland lists 13 buildings inside Mayfield’s locality, 1 of them in the top category.
Explore the history →Museums, castles, gardens and days out in and near Mayfield. Best known first.
MuseumNational Mining Museum Scotlandin town
CastleDalhousie Castle200 m outside town, to the southwest
Abbey or prioryNewbattle Abbey800 m outside town, to the northwest
CastleBorthwick Castle4.4 km outside town, to the southeast
CastleDalkeith Palace1.8 km outside town, to the north
Castle · Historic Environment ScotlandCrichton Castle3.8 km outside town, to the southeastPhotos: each place’s Wikidata image, from Wikimedia Commons under the licence below (our copy, resized).
Data highlights are ordered by what stands out in Mayfield.
Graduates make up a fifth of adults. People 65 and over make up 17% of the town, below both Midlothian’s towns (19%) and Scotland’s towns (19%). The age that splits Mayfield in two is 40.4. The 15-to-24 age group makes up 11% of residents.
52% women, 48% men
About 93 men for every 100 women. Across Scotland, 51% of residents are women.
| Mayfield | Midlothian | Scotland | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under 15 | 19% | 18% | 15% |
| 15–24 | 11% | 10% | 12% |
| 25–44 | 26% | 27% | 26% |
| 45–64 | 27% | 26% | 27% |
| 65+ | 17% | 19% | 19% |
| No qualifications | 21% | 17% | 17% |
| Apprenticeship | 9.6% | 9.6% | 7.5% |
| Highers or similar | 10% | 11% | 11% |
| Degree level | 20% | 27% | 32% |
Scotland’s Census 2022 · Midlothian and Scotland: all residents of their towns · OGL
Between them, five primaries and one secondary teach 2,421 pupils in Mayfield. Of its 6 schools, two are shown below, each with the reason.
| School | Level | Pupils | Letter |
|---|---|---|---|
| Newtongrange Primary SchoolLargest primary schoolPrimary | Primary | 349 | – |
| Newbattle High SchoolLargest secondary schoolSecondary | Secondary | 1,313 | D |
Scotland’s Census was taken on 20 March 2022, a year after England and Wales’s lockdown census; 30% of workers were mainly at home, and shares here are of those who travelled.
Jobs per working resident: 0.4. Short trips to work, under 5 km: 31%, about level with Midlothian’s towns (28%) and below Scotland’s towns (44%). Unemployment benefit claims reached 3.5% of 16 to 64s in 2026. Work in town: a tenth of resident commuters.
Scotland’s Census 2022 (NRS), method of travel and distance to work · DWP claimant count · OGL
Of the 7 towns in Midlothian, Mayfield has the largest share in bad or very bad health: 7.5%. Disability touches just over a quarter of the town’s population. At the census, 77% of people in Mayfield called their health good or very good, below Midlothian’s towns (80%) and Scotland’s towns (78%) alike.
| Census 2022 | Mayfield | Midlothian | Scotland |
|---|---|---|---|
| Good or very good health | 77% | 80% | 78% |
| Bad or very bad health | 7.5% | 6.2% | 7.2% |
| Activities limited (health or disability) | 26% | 23% | 24% |
Scotland’s Census 2022, general health and disability · Public Health Scotland life expectancy by intermediate zone, 2020–24 · OGL · Young towns look healthier on these answers, which aren’t adjusted for age; the Health Grade uses measures that are, such as life expectancy and early deaths.
7% of households rent privately. Owners make up 55% of households, below both Midlothian’s towns (66%) and Scotland’s towns (60%). Only one of the 7 towns in Midlothian costs less to buy into than Mayfield, whose median sale is £213,700.
Registers of Scotland data-zone sale prices · Scottish Government council tax · Scotland’s Census 2022 tenure · OGL · The Scottish median is our estimate from data-zone sales, brought to early-2025 prices.
The heritage lists give each building’s grade but not its age, so we don’t say which is oldest.
Mayfield’s listed buildings include Newtongrange, Lady Victoria Colliery, Category A. At the top of the list, 1 are Category A and 2 Category B. Of the town’s land, 5% lies in conservation areas, about level with Midlothian’s towns (4%) and above Scotland’s towns (1%).
Historic Environment Scotland list, October 2026 · OGL
13 listed buildings in Mayfield, 1 of them in the top category.
Lothianbridge, Newbattle Viaduct: Photo: Klaus with K · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Newtonloan, Toll House: Photo: John Riddell · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Newtongrange, Main Street, The Dean Tavern: Photo: Jim Barton · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Lothianbridge, The Sun Inn: Photo: Alan Murray-Rust · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Geograph
10 notable people were born in Mayfield.
Billy Ritchie: Behrens, Herbert / Anefo, CC0
The nearest towns and villages, from National Records of Scotland’s 2022 localities. See them on the map →
| Town | People | Miles | Overall | Cost | Safety | Health |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mayfield | 14,259 | — | — | B+ | — | D |
| Dalkeith | 15,125 | 1.5 | — | B | — | C− |
| Gorebridge | 8,900 | 1.8 | — | B+ | — | D |
| Bonnyrigg | 18,088 | 2.2 | — | B | — | C− |
| Danderhall | 3,389 | 3.7 | — | B | — | C− |
| Loanhead | 7,007 | 4.1 | — | B− | — | C− |
| Musselburgh | 21,476 | 4.8 | — | B+ | — | C− |
| Wallyford | 4,493 | 4.8 | — | B− | — | D |
No Scottish town has a Safety Grade or an overall grade yet: Police Scotland doesn’t publish street-level crime. People: Census 2022. Miles: centre to centre.
Homes cost less than in most UK towns: the median sale over three years was £213,700, against £277,000 in the typical town in England and Wales. On cost of living it is the 262nd most affordable of 296 Scottish towns.
Surface water isn’t included. Check a specific address on GOV.UK’s flood risk service.
Town in Midlothian, Scotland
Mayfield is a locality of 14,259 people, in the Midlothian council area. TownRatings uses National Records of Scotland’s 2022 localities as Scotland’s towns: the physical town, as people mean the word, rather than a council area, so its figures cover the town itself. Localities split the big settlements into their towns, as ONS’s 2022 boundaries split conurbations in England and Wales.
Built from NRS geography and Census 2022
Sources: Scotland’s Census 2022 (National Records of Scotland), output areas summed to the NRS 2022 locality · Registers of Scotland house price statistics, medians and quartiles of residential sales by 2022 data zone, 2004 to 2025 (the 2023 to 2025 headline brought to early-2025 prices with each council’s medians) · Scottish Government, Council Tax by band 2026-27; Scottish Water charges 2026-27 · Scottish Government, Recorded Crime in Scotland (crimes, offences and clear-up rates by council area, 2016-17 to 2025-26); Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation 2020v2 crime domain and SIMD crime indicators (2014/15, 2017/18), 2011 data zones with Census 2022 residents · ONS gross disposable household income by council (2022), scaled to household income on England and Wales’s councils, with Scotland’s Census 2022 households · DWP / ONS Claimant Count via Nomis (2022 data zones, January to August 2026), over residents aged 16 to 64 at Scotland’s Census 2022; council series since 2015 · Scottish Government school contact list (31 July 2026) and school summary statistics (pupil census, September 2025); School Information Dashboard leavers’ attainment by school, 2022-23 to 2024-25 (data.gov.scot) · TownRatings grades: our own summary of the data, ranked against UK towns only. All under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Contains HM Land Registry data © Crown copyright and database right 2026. Contains OS data © Crown copyright and database right 2026 (ONS boundaries). Northern Ireland: Source: NISRA; contains Land & Property Services data and Ordnance Survey of Northern Ireland information, © Crown copyright, licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Scotland: contains National Records of Scotland data, Registers of Scotland data and SEPA data, © Crown copyright / © SEPA 2025, licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.